Up to now the only way available for providing a part of a surface, such as of paving blocks, with a pattern indicating a pedestrian crossing, a stop sign or other such traffic sign or for providing the entire surface of the blocks with a pattern has been to paint the surface with a coating material such as paint or to inlay the desired pattern.
Since the patterns painted on a part or all of the surface of paving blocks are exposed to abrasion such as from the footwear of pedestrians walking on the blocks, and the tires of vehicles driving over them, they quickly wear off and have to be redone at frequent intervals. The amount of labor involved in this work is considerable. Where the pattern is formed by inlaying, the work itself is troublesome and very costly.
The present inventors previously proposed methods for readily producing various types of patterned shaped articles which do not lose their surface patterns and do not become unsightly even when exposed to surface abrasion, using at least one means for holding the material selected from among an auxiliary form corresponding to the pattern to be expressed (in Japanese Patent Laid-Open Application Nos. 4-105903, 5-38707, 5-38708 and 5-238767), a cell body consisting of cylindrical bodies of a set height (in Japanese Patent Laid-Open Application Nos. 4-140104, 4-139083, 5-847157 and 5-84714), and a bristling body (in Japanese Patent Laid-Open Application Nos. 4-345803, 5-324068, 5-237816 and 5-237821).
The object of the present invention is to provide a method of producing patterned shaped articles with clearly defined patterns readily formed by pattern courses of prescribed thickness.